Volleyball: Lansdale Catholic defeats Cardinal O'Hara in 3-1 victory

RADNOR — Even though his team trailed by a game and was behind in the fourth set, Cardinal O’Hara coach Bill Collins knew that if the Lions could somehow manage to get the match to a fifth game, the odds were in his favor.

O’Hara was undefeated in matches that went to five sets and Collins was confident that if the Lions could get the match to a fifth set, that trend would continue.

There was only one major problem. Lansdale Catholic, one of O’Hara’s five-set victims during the regular-season, had no intention of letting the match get to that point and did not.

After losing the first set and falling behind by four points early in the second set, the Crusaders rallied to win their first Catholic League volleyball championship with a 3-1 triumph over O’Hara Sunday at Cabrini College.

The 17-25, 25-23, 25-20, 25-17 loss was more like a recurring bad dream for the Lions. It was the second straight year O’Hara reached the PCL final only to settle for second place.

What made it even more painful is that the Lions (15-4 overall) had an 8-4 lead in the second set after dominating play in the opening set.

“You have to give them credit,” Collins said. “We’re up 1-0 and 8-4 in the second set and at no point did they think it was over,” Collins said. “Even when we made that run in the set to tie it at 23-23, they did not panic. They were able to stem the tide. It’s their day. They’re an exceptional team.”

It looked like it was going to be O’Hara’s day when the Lions won the first set convincingly and opened up that 8-4 advantage in the second set largely behind the play of Catholic League MVP Jamie Gallagher (37 assists), Meghan Czapka (15 kills and nine digs), Leah D’Alessandris (14 kills and 11 digs) and Megan Rasnake (seven kills, one block).

LC coach Joann Pisch called a timeout before the match got out of hand and it turned out to be a momentum-shifting stoppage.

The Crusaders (18-2), who will play for the District 12 Class AA title Friday at Community College of Philadelphia, reeled off five straight points to take a 9-8 advantage. While the match would be tied six more times, including 23-all, LC never lost the lead and eventually won it on a kill by Brynne Taylor and a block by Taylor and Dutkiewicz.

“We wanted to win so badly,” Dutkiewicz said. “We realized that if we could pick everything up and work as a team and go for it, we could win. We had nothing to lose so we went for it.”

Other than a few ties early in the final two sets, it was all Lansdale Catholic.

“We lost our aggressiveness,” Collins said. “We were aggressive, but not smart and aggressive. We tried to pound some balls that we should not have and we tried to be too cute at times. They served better than we did. We served lollipops and they served tough.

“Their front row blocked. Every time we took a swing, they got a hand on the ball, which made it easy for the back row to pass. We didn’t block well and our back row was on their heels. From the middle of that second set on they absolutely dominated us. “

Lansdale Catholic only had four blocks that led directly to points, according to Pisch, but what the Crusaders were able to do at the net to neutralize the hitting of Rasnake, D’Alessandris and Czapka and keep the ball alive long enough to win the point.

“We train our girls to get behind the block and keep the ball alive and that’s what we did,” Pisch said. “We call it being scrappy. That’s what we had to do. We had to be scrappy and we were.”

No one was scrappier than sophomore setter Kaitlyn Kushman. She set the tone on offense and defense with 32 assists, 10 digs and four kills. Dutkiewicz also came up big with 21 digs. They kept the ball alive long enough for Taylor to finish with 17 kills and Kradzinski to collect 12 kills and 14 digs.

“We made an adjustment to their outside hitters, especially No. 18 (D’Allessandris),” Kradzinski said. “She was hitting the ball down the line and their other outside hitters (Rasnake and Czapka) were hitting a lot of cross-court shots. Once we adjusted to that and focused on the game and taking it away from them it all came together for us.”

The result was a Catholic League title for the Crusaders and a disappointing second-place finish for the Lions. But unlike last year’s loss to Archbishop Carroll, this loss did not end O’Hara’s season. The Lions will play the winner of the Northeast-Central match for the District 12 Class AAA title Friday at CCP.

“We feel a lot better that we still get to go to practice on Wednesday,” D’Alessandris said. “We still have a chance to go to states.”